Omo Box

Finally I've set-up my blog, posted the reference e-mails and now I get to stand on my Soap Box and lecture the... well the world, or at least those of you reading this.

Moving House - Each of the e-mails previously posted in one way or another “talk up” South Africa and it's current situation, written by people living in South Africa, there's nothing like moving to a new home to put your old one into perspective, you're quickly able to realise what the good things were 'cause you miss them and all the things you didn't like about your old home while you lived there can seem a little silly or perhaps justified, you may even discover some things that you never knew you disliked! It is this the perspective of someone that's moved which I'll bring to this subject.

Head Up, Chest Out... Damn right! I am proud to be South African and here I could list the reasons and bore you with usual sunny skies and braai vleis, but it's mostly the people. Yes there a fair amount of asses and dweebs, tweedle-dumbs and tweedle-dees (delete as appropriate), but most of the people of all races who you meet are genuinely warm and friendly, and that is something to be really proud of! So why did I leave South Africa?

In A Perfect World – I'd still have left South Africa, my perfect life would involve spending a decade living and working on each continent, there is so much to see and the world is such an exciting place to explore and then you still have to make time to go back to the nicer places a few more times. I'm definitely a traveller but not the ruck-sack do it on a shoe-string kind of traveller more a “trekker” really pack-up everything and go!

Get Real - But I'm romanticising now, the motivation for moving to the United Kingdom was three-fold, firstly there was the small matter of my partner whom I had met in South Africa and who'd moved to the UK we were not together at that point but very very interested in each other also I needed to get out of South Africa for several reasons including my well being and career, thirdly my wanderlust: it was an opportunity to live and work in another country.

So here we are; you know that I'm a proudly South African and living abroad, with something to say about my “Old Home”... See you with my next post where I'll be getting down and dirty in that Can O' Worms!

P.S. Omo is a South African brand of Washing Powder, Omo Box = Soap Box. “braai vleis” is almost like barbeque except better and although “trekker” in English and Afrikaans are synonymous, it is also Afrikaans slang for “tosser”... don't go there!